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Patriots ready for big stage

By David Pevear, dpevear@lowellsun.com

Updated:
12/09/2012 06:50:18 AM EST

FOXBORO -- Nowadays it seems like just another primetime football game to us, the NFL having since taken over Sunday and Thursday nights as well, determined to maximize its empire before it all comes crashing down under the weight of post-concussion syndrome.

Most NFL players are too young to have heard Howard Cosell, Dandy Don and the Giff pontificate -- back when Monday Night Football was, well, MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL! -- yet players still consider Monday night The Night for hiking the ball. They get a little more juiced, it seems, no PEDs required.

"There's a little bit of a different feeling just because of how special it is to play on Monday Night Football," said quarterback Tom Brady, sounding very much like an ESPN commercial.

It is not so much that NFL players get extra excited about you and I tuning in on Monday nights. They assume we the fantasy players of Football America will always watch.

But since Tuesday is usually the players' day off in the NFL, the "big stage" allure for the Monday night game participants involves the likelihood their peers will also be watching. Most of them may be too sore and tired on Sunday nights to watch, and on Thursday nights they are probably too focused on their upcoming opponents to care.

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That leaves Monday night, the "big stage" as the players call it, or at least as those players who have never played in a Super Bowl call it.

"Anytime you have a chance to play on a big stage, I think you have to come through," said Houston running back Arian Foster, who leads the AFC in rushing (1,102 yards) and the NFL in touchdowns (15). "It shows the character of the team -- the bigger the stage, the better you play."

Always-excitable ESPN analyst Jon Gruden, Mike Tirico's wingman, sounds really really excited for this Monday Nighter to arrive. Of course, Patriots (9-3) vs. Texans (11-1), given the two teams' current positions in the AFC power structure, would be exciting if it were scheduled for Wednesday morning. "The idea of seeing Matt Schaub and the balanced Texans offense going up against Bill Belichick, Matt Patricia and the Patriots makes me want to get to Foxboro tonight," said Gruden ... last Thursday.

The Bovada online sportsbook lists the Patriots and Texans as co-9/2 favorites to win the Super Bowl. Both teams being from the AFC, of course, only one will get to New Orleans for XLVII on Feb. 3.

On the big stage immediately before us, this will be the Patriots' only Monday Night Football appearance of 2012. They appeared twice on MNF each of the past three seasons, and in seven of the past 10 seasons since winning their first Super Bowl in 2001. The Patriots all-time are 21-22 on MNF, including back in the day many memorable heartbreaking defeats (Joe Washington's kickoff return in the rain ... another loss in Miami the night Cosell informed America that John Lennon had been shot). But the Patriots with Brady as their starting quarterback are 12-4 on MNF. Brady said anytime you play an 11-1 football team, "you want to see how you match up,"

"It will be fun," he said.

This past week, Houston wide receiver Andre Johnson called it "the biggest game in the history of this franchise." Unlike Arizona's great wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, who was diminished by substandard quarterback play here in September, Johnson has Schaub, thus presenting the most elite challenge New England's improving secondary has encountered this season.

Johnson, 31, who was injured most of last season, was the AFC Offensive Player of the Month in November when he had 35 catches for 614 yards, including 14 for 273 in an OT win over Jacksonville. "He's really feeling like he's hitting his stride, and he really feels like he's getting back to the Andre of old," said Schaub.

While the Patriots' defense copes with Foster on the ground and Schaub-to-Johnson in the air, New England's offensive line must handle Houston's considerable pass rush. Gruden calls Houston defensive end J.J. Watt "unblockable."

So, we can't wait for Monday night. To quote that brain-cell-depleted country-singing legend (is that an oxymoron?), fired last year by ESPN: "Are you ready for some football?!"

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